A bacterial culture can do the work of separating rare-earth elements, or lanthanides, used widely in advanced batteries and magnets (Environ. Sci. Technol. Lett. 2016, DOI: 10.1021/acs.estlett.6b00064). The newly developed method is an initial step in efforts to create alternatives to the time-consuming and less-than-green solvent extractions now used in industry.

Rare-earth elements have their dance cards full these days. Kilograms of lanthanum go into every hybrid car battery, and . . .